How To Become A Human Service Specialist: What It Is and Career Path

What is a human service specialist and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

4 min read

Quoted expert

Donald Spears

Human service specialists provide a variety of social services with an aim to improve the quality of life of those they serve. They can work for many organizations and under the direction of others and directly with the population being served. They work with social workers, psychologists, and other professionals.

Key duties and responsibilities that human service specialists fulfill in this capacity include interviewing clients to determine their eligibility for various social programs. They also help develop programs based on agency funding. Moreover, they gather more information on clients based on investigation of public records. Lastly, they advise or offer mental health counselling or assessment to determine eligibility on medical attention or medication. A high school diploma is the minimum education requirement for this profession; however, many have completed an associate's degree in human services or a specialty area such as gerontology or addiction studies. Essential skills required include patience, compassion, analytical, and planning.

The average hourly salary is $22.35, which amounts to $46,485 annually. In addition, the career is expected to grow in the near future which will result in more opportunities in this profession across the United States.

What general advice would you give to a human service specialist?

Donald Spears

National Organization for Human Services Board Secretary, Professor of Human Services, National Organization for Human Services

The human services field is vital to society and is growing tremendously. Human service professionals will likely be presented with new challenges as the Baby Boomers continue to age, live longer, and remain active later than previous generations. Other pressing issues include the continuing national opioid epidemic, helping people with autism meet their potential, and supporting families as loved ones are diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia. There are other large-scale issues that are just as crucial, such as health care access and affordability, poverty, and social justice. Many people think of human services as being primarily face-to-face work with a client, which is often the case, but human service professionals also work on state and national levels, which is essential to creating a more fair and just society.

ScoreHuman Service SpecialistUS Average

Salary

3.8

Avg. Salary $49,025

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

8.9

Growth rate 12%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

10.0

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 2.13%

Asian 6.86%

Black or African American 15.05%

Hispanic or Latino 18.05%

Unknown 5.15%

White 52.75%

Gender

female 77.51%

male 22.49%

Age - 43

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 43

Stress level

8.9

Stress level is very high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

8.1

Complexity level is challenging

7 - challenging

Work life balance

6.2

Work life balance is fair

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a human service specialist

Explore human service specialist education requirements

Most common human service specialist degrees

Bachelor's

63.9 %

Master's

14.1 %

Associate

12.4 %

Start to develop specific human service specialist skills

Skills	Percentages
Mental Health	13.15%
Social Work	10.50%
Program Eligibility	5.96%
Medicaid	5.46%
Social Services	5.33%

Complete relevant human service specialist training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 1-3 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New human service specialists learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a human service specialist based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real human service specialist resumes.

Research human service specialist duties and responsibilities

Manage the MSW staff and coordinate all social service and select patient service activities.
Establish effective liaisons with community agencies to ensure coordination of services to patients.
Developed/Implement a health education/risk reduction program for HIV/AIDS patients engaging in high-risk behaviors.
Help clients reach self-sufficiency by referring clients to employment and vocational rehabilitation agencies.

Prepare your human service specialist resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your human service specialist resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a human service specialist resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable human service specialist resume templates

Build a professional human service specialist resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your human service specialist resume.

Apply for human service specialist jobs

Now it's time to start searching for a human service specialist job. Consider the tips below for a successful job search:

Browse job boards for relevant postings
Consult your professional network
Reach out to companies you're interested in working for directly
Watch out for job scams

How do human service specialists rate their job?

-/5

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Human service specialist reviews

A zippia user wrote a review on Jan 2024

Cons

Stressful, dangerous neighborhoods, sometimes parents are dangerous as well. Work life balance isn't good. Documentation is very time consuming and you will bring that home to finish. If your agency requires that you do your app recorded time sheets then that will prove ardously time consuming constaint that cuts right into your work/home life balance...it's terrible. Wear and tear on your car, no shows from parents upsetting children and paid mileage is horrible. Get ready to barely have a life.

A zippia user wrote a review on Apr 2019